


His Eyes

by Frumpologist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, F/M, Infidelity, Pining, Sexual Content, seeking comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:53:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22167424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frumpologist/pseuds/Frumpologist
Summary: In the wake of a proposal, Lily panics and searches out her best friend to calm her nerves. What was supposed to be a calming draught instead has disastrous consequences that forces Lily to think about what — and who — she really wants.
Relationships: Lily Evans Potter/Severus Snape
Comments: 22
Kudos: 106





	His Eyes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [a_belladonna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_belladonna/gifts).



> Written for Smutty Claus 2019 for a_belladonna. You had so many wonderful prompts and kinks, which made writing a character I’ve never written in the limelight far more fun! I hope you enjoyed this little tale! 
> 
> I owe a huge debt of gratitude to my alpha, mcal, who talked me off so many Severus Snape shaped ledges while I panicked and flailed about this story. Nervous doesn’t begin to describe how I feel about this story, haha.

  
Lily Evans was in a panic.

James proposed. He’d _proposed_ , and she’d just stared down at him as if he were speaking an entirely different language. That was, until she turned on her heel and ran away as fast as she could. With James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter all yelling her name, she ran and apparated as soon as she was out of sight.

She hadn’t meant to show up in Spinners End. That had been quite an accident. Lily checked herself for any splinching — none, thankfully — and tore off in the direction of _his_ house, because where else could she possibly go?

She needed her best friend.

It didn’t matter that they’d been estranged since the end of Hogwarts. She didn’t care if he hated her potential-fiance. And, if Lily had any misgivings about his extracurricular activities during school, she chose to ignore them because she was on a ledge and dangling precariously from it. She _needed_ Severus — good or bad as he was anymore.

Her fist banged on his door. Harder and harder, and no one was answering. She was about to throw pebbles at the yellowing window to her left, when a small, mousy woman with dark eyes yanked open the door.

“What’dyou want?” she demanded, eyes filled with judgment at the white cotton dress that hung no longer than Lily’s knees.

“I was looking for Severus,” Lily whispered, her hands on her throat as if that was going to stop the choking sensation that clawed its way through her chest. “Is Severus home?”

The mousy woman — Severus’ mum? — narrowed her eyes and let the silence settle between them for a moment. Lily’s nerves flared; if she couldn’t have Severus’ shoulder to cry on now, she had no idea where to go or who to talk to. No one would understand her misgivings, not like Sev could. Her lower lip trembled, and the mousy woman sighed.

“He’s round the back in the garden,” she deadpanned, and then shut the door in Lily’s face.

“What a treat,” Lily muttered as she turned from the door. “Severus?” She poked her head around the side of the home where a tall, rotting fence cut off the view of the back garden. There didn’t appear to be a gate anywhere, so she was left to call his name until he chose to answer her. “Severus Snape, don’t you dare think of leaving me out here all alone!”

“Lily?” Her name was a breath on the warm air. So many things wrapped themselves in the way he said her name; concern, confusion, that niggling thing she was sure she’d felt from him for so many years.

A gate suddenly appeared as if from nowhere and opened slowly to reveal a small overgrown garden of browning grass and wilting flowers. Severus stood there, his hand on the handle, and a straight line for a smile.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, deadpan, as his eyes searched the length of her body as if it would give him an answer.

Lily stepped forward and into the garden, past Severus. She wrung her hands together and turned to face him as he closed the gate and slowly spun to face her.

He looked tired, the pale complexion of his face hinting of long nights and even longer days. She wondered then what he’d gotten himself into, and if he was happy with the choices he’d made. Heaven knew that Lily wasn’t so sure of herself, either.

“Lily?”

The tears started then; she couldn’t stop them. They stung her eyes and rolled down the side of her face. She wiped them away angrily and huffed that they’d managed to escape at all.

“Lily.” His voice was firmer, and he approached her slowly. “What’s wrong? What happened? If it was Potter and his band of—”

She hiccuped a laugh, because _of course_ he would think that.

And, as always, _of course_ he was right.

Despite her warring feelings about James and Severus, Lily managed a small, wry smile. Her pink cheeks slowly faded to their normal, paler tone. She sniffed, rolled her eyes, and shook her head.

“It’s not—” she started, but Severus raised a dark eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest and she knew she’d been caught out. “Alright, fine. _Fine_. Does it make you happy if I say yes — yes, it’s James and _them_?”

“Of course it doesn’t make me _happy_ , Lily.” His eyes were dark as he rushed to her and wrapped his long fingers around her shoulders. “Your misery will never buy my happiness. Don’t you know that by now?”

Her heart clenched. “Yes, Sev, I know. I know that, I swear I do. It’s just—” she glanced around his garden helplessly and then turned her wide, green eyes to him.

“ _I_ am not what you need.” His lips barely moved as his fingers tightened on her shoulders.

Her stomach dropped, and she felt like an utter idiot having run to him. “I didn’t know where else to go. And I really shouldn’t be here, but you—”

“It’s a dangerous time, you know that,” he whispered, and then pulled her close to his chest. His arms wound around her neck and her ear pressed against the thick robes over his heartbeat, which she could hear faintly thrumming under her weight. “If someone would have seen you here, there’s nothing I could do. You do understand that, don’t you?”

“You wouldn’t try, even?” Lily huffed, angered more than chastised by his words. She shrugged out of his hold and glared up at him. “They’ve really got their fangs stuck in you, haven’t they? You know, Severus, I believed a lot of things about you, but I never would have believed that you could be fooled by someone as cruel as Vold—”

“Don’t!” He shot forward, hand outstretched, and covered her mouth. Their faces were so close, and neither of them breathed. Severus glanced around and as he slowly dropped his hand from her mouth, he hissed, “you can’t say his name like that. There’s a taboo!”

“A taboo?” Lily raised a winged brow and let a deep breath loose. “Blimey, but they’ve really gone to great lengths to make him scary, haven’t they?”

“Because he is,” Severus deadpanned, and put distance between them that had been scarce before. “And, of course I’d _try_ , Lily. I’d try until my last breath to keep you safe and out of their reach.”

“You would?” She felt silly, assuming he wouldn’t. Severus had always been there for her, but their relationship had been so strained since she’d started dating James in seventh year.

“Yes.”

He turned from her and walked to the small, wooden shed nestled at the very back of the garden. It didn’t look like much; a few bits of greying wood, a small crescent-shaped carving in the center of the door. Barely looked like Severus’ tall frame would fit inside of it without ducking. But, when he reached the door, he opened it and faced her. He gestured for Lily to follow him, and though she couldn’t really see how they could both fit in such a small place, she paced towards him and followed him into the tiny structure.

She wasn’t sure why it shocked her to discover that the shed was far bigger on the inside than the outside. Magic still had an uncanny ability to render her speechless, even after all these years. Her surprise must have shown, because Severus’ lips twitched at the corners as he gestured for her to walk further into the space.

It seemed to be his very own potions lab; complete with cauldrons and a half-stocked herb rack, some plants growing beneath the windows she was sure she couldn’t see from the outside. For as poor as she knew the Snapes to be, Lily was glad that he at least had this space to hide in when things got bad at home.

An escape, much like Severus was for her.

“No wonder you’re such a savant,” Lily laughed, her fingers gliding along the dusty wall as she meanders around the large space. “It was hardly fair for the rest of us if you had all this at your disposal all summer.”

He cracked a rare smile, the barely hint of teeth flashing in her direction. “Yes, well, if your family was half as horrible as mine, then perhaps you wouldn’t have come in second, and Slughorn would have liked you best.”

“Oh, but he did like me best, Sev,” she teased him with a small smile. “Said I had real gumption.” Her snark earned her a snort of amusement as he began fiddling with various herbs, tossing them into the cauldron. “What’s that you’re making?”

He grabbed a silver knife from beside his oaken cutting board and began chopping what she guessed was lavender. “Calming draught. You appear to have suffered a traumatic event, and since I was preparing ingredients already, it seemed fitting to brew something for you while you’re here.”

“Oh.” Lily glanced out the magical window where the sun was shining through to the thriving plants inside the shed. She turned from the sunlight, and found Severus with his dark hair hanging over his face as his hands worked on the delicate flower. Careful, as always, to avoid splintering the bud. “That’s so kind of you. You know I didn’t come here this afternoon to have you make me a draught?”

He raised one shoulder and slowly let it fall. “It’s what I know how to do, Lily. I’m not very good at the other comforting things. I’ve never been much of a hugger, for example.”

She couldn’t help the smile that crept up her face as she rounded his work table and stood by this side. Her fingers played with the peppermint leaves lying near big, meaty crocodile hearts, and she plucked one of them from the table. The scent of peppermint soothed her nerves as she rolled the leaf between her finger and rested her hip against the wooden work table.

“I think you’re doing just fine at the comforting thing,” she told him finally, bringing the tips of her fingers to her nose to breathe in the minty flavor. “You didn’t turn me away, even after we had our falling out before graduation.”

He paused in his chopping for only a moment, enough to glance at her from the corner of his eye, and then his movements were rougher, quicker. “You expected that Potter and his band of baboons would get along like the best of mates, and there was no way it was going to happen. Not with our history.”

Lily set the peppermint leaf down and sighed. “All I asked was that you give them another chance, Sev. Just like…”

He stopped chopping entirely and turned to her, mouth pulled down in a grimace. “Just like, what, exactly? I’m not a bloody charity case that needs your sympathy. I was doing just fine before you went and made me fall in love with you.”

“You don’t love me, Severus!” It reminded her of their last fight; he’d shouted at her about James Potter being a tosspot, and she’d shouted back that he, himself, was being a vile toerag. He’d also yelled that he’d loved her for six years and she… hesitated. “You don’t. You only think you do, because I’m nice to you, because we’re friends.”

“That’s not true,” he murmured, and set down his chopping knife. His dark eyes met hers and she gulped; there was so much in them, so many unspoken words glittering behind their near-black color. “I love you for many reasons, not least of which is your choice in mates — many of whom I do not approve.”

Lily crossed her arms, glaring. “Who I’m friends with is absolutely none of your concern. Not then and not anymore.”

“Which you made perfectly clear before graduation,” he agreed, and lifted his chin. “So, again I ask: why are you here, Lily?”

She wet her lips, and then chewed on the corner, as she thought through a list of reasons she was there; none of them definitively true. “Because you’re my best friend, Sev. Plain and simple, when I couldn’t think and I couldn’t breathe, my heart brought me here — to you.”

He stared at her for what felt like eons. Severus’ mouth opened, snapped shut, his lips twitched as if he was about to speak, and then he’d clamp them between his teeth as if trying to stifle any words that would escape him.

But, it was all in his eyes. Every word, every feeling, every unspoken emotion that caused her heart to hammer against her sternum and her blood to blaze a fiery path through her veins. She knew what he wanted to say. She could feel it in the way her throat closed and her stomach jolted.

Lily reached for him, placing her hand gently on his bare forearm. His skin was hot under hers, as if he’d held it to the cauldron’s fire. “You say you love me, Severus, but can’t you see that I’ve always loved you, too? You would just never _let_ me.”

The planes of his throat constricted, and his gaze darkened. If she were smart, she’d leave. And while Lily Evans was a smart girl, she was also a brave girl. Gryffindor, and all. So, she stood her ground and stared up at him defiantly, daring him to argue.

“You—” his arm moved back, meant to gesture something, but she never found out what, because instead it collided with the elevated cauldron and sent sparks and bubbling ingredients flying around them.

She shrieked. He cursed.

For a solid second, time stood still.

Dark purple goop splattered across the front of her dress. Flames sizzled along the fabric of his shirt. Before she could even think of pulling her wand, Severus had his aimed at her and vanished the material from her body, and then did the same with his shirt.

No one breathed.

The only sound was the dripping of potion from the table to the floorboards.

Lily turned bright red as Severus realized what he’d done, and then cursed again.

“I’ll grab a jumper for you,” he whispered, though he made no move to turn away.

She knew she should step back. Knew that her eyes shouldn’t linger on his, or wander down his nose to the deep bow of his lips, over his sharp chin, and the hollow of his throat, to the planes of his chest, and to his thin torso.

“Lily.” Her name was barely a breath between them as his index finger caught her chin and lifted her gaze back to his. “Please don’t.”

His tongue darted out, near imperceptible, but she caught the way it moistened his lips. Her eyes fixated on them, and she found herself asking a question that she’d been asking herself for years.

“Aren’t you curious, Sev?” Light, nearly a whisper but barely even that.

More silence. So quiet, in fact, that she was certain he could hear her heart slamming in her throat. But then his lips were on hers, and it was bliss.The way his tongue darted past the seam of her lips without any hesitation at all. The way he turned them just right so that her back dug into the wooden table. The way his hands cradled the sides of her face, fingers curling along the roots of her hair at her temples, as if he could somehow pull them even closer to one another. She basked in the feel of his warm mouth, and his tongue rolling against hers, and the noise that he made in the back of his throat when she demanded more from him.

He pulled away, a heavy sigh falling from his lips, and opened his eyes slowly.

They said so much, revealed the absolute truth of his heart, and it stole the breath from her lungs. Perhaps she’d been wrong; perhaps he’d loved her all along.

“We shouldn’t,” he said, but his hands still glided into her hair and rested against the back of her skull.

She could feel the immediate reaction he had to their kiss, a stiff erection against her hip. The power that flooded her should have scared her. It didn’t. Instead, she found herself drunk on it, wanting to be the cause of his swollen lips growing redder, wanting to be the reason he was breathless and panting, and the reason he finally, after so many years of being reserved and quiet and timid, lost control.

“You don’t believe that,” she whispered, and her palms slid from his sides to his back. “It’s in your eyes — you want this, you want me.”

“Merlin help me, I do.”

And then he was on her again. Lips slanted against hers, his tongue doing delicious things as his hands traveled from her head to her neck and down, down, down to her bra-covered chest. He paused, hovered over them for what felt like an age, before she took matters into her own hands and pressed his hands to her chest.

She swallowed the noise he made and when she was sure he wasn’t going to pull away, moved her hands to his cheeks and deepened their kiss.Severus kissed her like he meant it, like he’d been wanting to do it for an eternity and couldn’t breathe until their lips finally met and he was kissing her as if she were oxygen and he was suffocating.

It didn’t matter that she’d just run away from James, that Severus’ mum was a short dash across the garden, or that her dress was vanished to who-knew-where and she had nowhere to apparate to when all was said and done.

What mattered were his hands, potioneer’s hands, calloused and deft, pulling the cups of her bra down and palming her breasts. What mattered was the way she could feel his thundering heart with her hand splayed on his chest before it travelled down between their hips and she felt the sheer size of him in her petite hand. What mattered was the thrill that shot through her when he bucked against her palm and nipped her bottom lip and groaned her name into her mouth.

And what struck her the most, more than the physical touch or the emotional connection, was the way his eyes shone back at her when their lips finally parted. It was Severus Snape bare before her, far more intimately than if he were already completely nude. It was enough to make her breathing catch in her throat, a hoarse _oh_ escaping her.

“Is this what you want, Lily?” Severus asked, his hands beginning their descent toward her panty line. “We can stop now — if you’ve changed your mind.”

“I haven’t,” she answered immediately, and her hand clenched around him earning a deep, guttural noise in response. “Touch me, please.”

When his hand slipped past the line of her knickers, she jerked against his fingers and let her head drop against his shoulder. It was clumsy and the angle was awkward, but when he slid through her heated flesh and curled his fingers inside of her, Lily began moving her hand against his length to the rhythm he created.

The shed filled with the sound of their breathing, little puffs of air that begged for more and pleaded for this moment to never end.

She jerked against Sev’s hand, her body tumbling and careening towards her orgasm, and when she repeated his name, over and over and over again, he latched his lips to the sensitive skin of her throat and sucked until it bruised and she was marked by his tongue.

His hand on her wrist stopped her movements on his erection, and she peered up at him through dazed, wide green eyes. “Sev—”

“You’re perfect,” he whispered, and the words were pained and strained as he pulled his hand from her knickers. He kissed her chastely and snatched his wand off the table. A blanket appeared on the hard floor, and he kneeled onto it and stared up at her with those blown-wide eyes. “You’ll tell me to stop if—”

“I don’t want to stop.”

Lily pulled her knickers down her legs and then straddled Severus’ hips. She didn’t worry that she appeared too wanton, or that she was flushed and freckled and a mess. Instead, Sev’s hands held her hips tightly and she lowered herself over him slowly, Lily felt perfectly comfortable and content. A sigh escaped her as he filled her completely, before her hips began to move of their own accord, led by Severus and the scant bit of pressure he placed on her hips.

“Lily.”

Her name was an exaltation from his barely-opened lips. It spurred her on to snap her hips; she’d only done this a few times, and she was certainly no expert, but her body guided her and she didn’t stop it. Her hands rested on his chest, fingers splayed, as she chased her impending release.

“Look at me,” he breathed, thumbs caressing the soft flesh beside her hip bone.

Her eyes opened and found him staring up at her. Every feeling that lived and breathed and multiplied within her reflected back from his dark eyes. He cherished her — truly loved her, despite that she’d protested the thought before. It was there, plain as day, in the shadows that sparked behind his eyes.

She felt his thighs tense beneath her and then his fingers were on her clit and applying the most delicious pressure. Lily’s movements became jerky and her legs quivered as the coil in her belly tightened and tightened. He met her thrust for thrust until she was a moaning mess above him.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered as his free hand clenched her waist and he thrust up.

It was less than a minute before her muscles tensed and she came with his name pouring from her lips like a prayer. He followed soon after, his fingers still sliding through her folds as she rode the waves of her pleasure.

She didn’t move, not for ages. His hand caressed her back, up the length of her spine and down again as they both caught their breath. Her chest was flat against his, and she relished in the way he worshipped her body, soft breaths and quiet praises in her ear.

There was something humbling about the way that Severus loved her. Quiet and sure, as if it was the thing he’d been born for. That nothing could stop it — not a festering war or her stupid decisions; it was infinite and unsinkable, and it warmed her thudding heart as she turned her head and rested her chin just shy of his clavicle.

“I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

His hands tensed on her torso, and she felt the breath collect in his lungs beneath her.

“I’m not sorry that it happened, either.”

Severus released his breath and the sweet warmth fanned across her face, blowing the sweaty strands of her hair over her freckled shoulder. “I don’t want to ask what this means.”

“It means that we both have a role to play in these dark times,” she whispered, bringing a hand to his dark hair and running her fingers through it. “And that I need you to stay alive so that we can explore this more when the worst is behind us.”

“And your… current situation?” He furrowed his eyebrows, but she smoothed away the crinkled line between them.

“We’ll figure it out when Vol—” she stopped herself as his eyes widened, and quirked her lips, “when it’s over. We’ll give this a proper go, yeah?”

“But—”

He put her fingers on his lips to stop him from ruining the moment. “There are a lot of things that I have to consider. I thought my life was planned, but it appears there’s room for change.”

“Do you swear it, Lily? On your magic, you’ll find me when it’s all over?”

“I swear it.” Lily ducked her chin, a firm promise that she knew she’d keep until the day she died. “Don’t get so far lost into his cause that you lose this brilliant heart, Severus. Dumbledore can help — let him.”

His eyes traced her face, and he held her tighter than before as he lifted his head and pressed a delicate, lingering kiss on her lips. “I’ll let him try,” he promised. “For you, I’ll die trying.”

She didn’t know how much time they would have, today or in the future. But, what Lily knew then, more than ever before, was that her heart belonged to the man stroking her back and whispering his worries into her ear. She loved him at his best, at his worst, and everything in between.

And when they pulled out of these dark times, she was going to make good on her promise.   



End file.
